Method of fabricating liquid crystal display
A liquid crystal display device includes a driving circuit provided with a switching device on a liquid crystal display panel, the switching device including a plurality of thin film transistors connected in parallel and commonly interconnected using a gate electrode.
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This application is a Divisional of application Ser. No. 10/876,619 filed Jun. 28, 2004, now U.S. Pat. No. 7,550,764 now allowed; which claims priority to Korean Patent Application No. 10-2003-57518, filed Aug. 20, 2003 all of which are hereby incorporated by reference for all purposes as if fully set forth herein.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a display device and a method of fabricating a display device, and more particularly, to a liquid crystal display device and a method of fabricating a liquid crystal display device.
2. Description of the Related Art
In general, a liquid crystal display (LCD) device controls light transmittance of a liquid crystal material using an electric field to display images.
Although not shown, gate lines and data lines are arranged to cross each other within the LCD panel 5. Each of the liquid crystal cells is positioned at each area where the gate lines cross the data lines. In addition, the LCD panel 5 is provided with a pixel electrode and a common electrode for applying an electric field to each of the liquid crystal cells. Each pixel electrode is connected, via source and drain electrodes of a thin film transistor (TFT), which functions as a switching device, to any one of the data lines. Similarly, the gate electrodes of the TFT are connected to any one of the gate lines, thereby allowing a pixel voltage signal to be supplied to the pixel electrodes for each of the data lines.
The TFT allows the pixel voltage signal to be charged in a corresponding pixel electrode in response to a gate high voltage Vgh transmitted along the gate lines. Accordingly, the liquid crystal cells charge the corresponding pixel voltage signals from the data lines when the TFT is turned ON due to the gate high voltage Vgh that is sequentially supplied along the gate lines, and any remaining charge is retained when the TFT is turned ON again. The pixel voltage signal is to be charged in the liquid crystal cell of a certain nth-numbered gate line remaining due to a storage capacitor Cst (not shown) formed by an overlap of the pixel electrode and the gate line of a previous stage gate line.
In general, the gate high voltage Vgh is supplied to each of the gate lines for every frame only during a period of time that the gate line is driven, i.e., only during one horizontal period 1 H allowing the pixel voltage signal charged in the pixel electrode, and a gate low voltage Vgl is supplied during a rest period. The storage capacitor Cst remains charged with a voltage charged to the pixel electrode of a present stage gate line by the gate low voltage Vgl supplied to the gate line of the previous stage gate line.
In
The data driver 17 and the gate driver 27 are directly connected to the LCD panel 5, and are both integrated into a plurality of integrated circuits (IC's). In addition, each of the data drive ICs 15 and the gate drive ICs 25 are mounted in a tape carrier package (TCP) to be connected to the LCD panel 5 using a tape automated bonding (TAB) system, or mounted onto the LCD panel 5 by a chip on glass (COG) system.
In
Switching devices have been proposed in the U.S. Pat. No. 6,522,768, which is hereby incorporated by reference in its entirety, that may be used in a driving circuit of an LCD device. Accordingly, although the switching devices, i.e., TFTs, have rapid response speeds, the TFTs are formed of amorphous silicon fabricated using simple processes and have relatively good uniformity rather than formed of polycrystalline silicon fabricated using more difficult processes, such as crystallizing a silicon layer using a laser beam.
In
For example, although the switching device has a relatively wide channel width for switching relatively high voltages, the decrease of the variation of the current flowing within the channel of the switching device is dependent upon the increase of the channel width of the switching device. Moreover, a current efficiency is decreased depending on the increase of the channel width, as shown in
In addition, when the switching device becomes damaged due to sparks created during fabrication processes or as a result of overcurrents, switching characteristic of the switching device deteriorates, thereby providing abnormal driving characteristics.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTIONAccordingly, the present invention is directed to an LCD device and method of fabricating an LCD device that substantially obviates one or more of the problems due to limitations and disadvantages of the related art.
An object of the present invention is to provide an LCD device including a driving circuit having an enhanced response speed.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a method of fabricating an LCD device including a driving circuit having an enhanced response speed.
Another object of the present invention is to provide an LCD device including a driving circuit having enhanced stability.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a method of fabricating an LCD device including a driving circuit having enhanced stability.
Additional features and advantages of the invention will be set forth in the description which follows, and in part will be apparent from the description, or may be learned by practice of the invention. The objectives and other advantages of the invention will be realized and attained by the structure particularly pointed out in the written description and claims hereof as well as the appended drawings.
To achieve these and other advantages and in accordance with the purpose of the present invention, as embodied and broadly described, a liquid crystal display device includes a driving circuit provided with a switching device on a liquid crystal display panel, the switching device including a plurality of thin film transistors connected in parallel and commonly interconnected using a gate electrode.
In another aspect, a method of fabricating a liquid crystal display includes forming a switching device on a liquid crystal display panel, the switching device having a plurality of amorphous thin film transistors connected in parallel, wherein the forming the switching device includes forming a gate electrode on a substrate, forming a plurality of source electrodes and a plurality of drain electrodes arranged to oppose each other with the gate electrode therebetween, and forming a semiconductor pattern including a plurality of channels between the source electrodes and the drain electrodes.
It is to be understood that both the foregoing general description and the following detailed description are exemplary and explanatory and are intended to provide further explanation of the invention as claimed.
The accompanying drawings, which are included to provide a further understanding of the invention and are incorporated in and constitute a part of this specification, illustrate embodiments of the invention and together with the description serve to explain the principles of the invention. In the drawings:
Reference will now be made in detail to the preferred embodiments of the present invention, examples of which are illustrated in the accompanying drawings.
In
Accordingly, although one of the switching devices 185 may be damaged due to overcurrents flowing through any one of the TFTs and/or sparks created during fabrication processes, remaining ones of the switching device 185 may be normally driven. Thus, the switching device 185 formed in the driving circuit may have a configuration in which a plurality of TFTs may be electrically independent and mutually connected in parallel, thereby increasing stability of the switching devices 185.
In
Then, an amorphous silicon layer and a N+ amorphous silicon layer may be sequentially formed on the lower substrate 102 having the gate insulating film 144 using a depositing method, such as PECVD and sputtering. Next, the amorphous silicon layer and the N+ amorphous silicon layer may be patterned by photolithographic processes and an etching process using a mask. Then, a semiconductor pattern 168 may be formed to have a number of narrow channel widths, wherein the semiconductor pattern 168 may have a double layer configuration comprising an active layer 114 and an ohmic contact layer 148.
In
In
In
In
In
An effective channel width of the semiconductor pattern 168 may be formed as a summation of each of the channel width W2 of the plurality of narrow channels 195 formed on the semiconductor pattern 168. Accordingly, each of the switching devices in a driving circuit of an LCD panel may be electrically separated and connected in parallel. Thus, effects of a wide channel width may be obtained by adding each of the narrow channel widths W2. Furthermore, since each of the channels 195 may be electrically separated from each other, each of the TFTs may not affect each other during operation. Since deterioration of current efficiency may be reduced by widening of the channel widths, electric charge mobility may increase, thereby enhancing response speed. In addition, since each of the switching devices may be formed to be electrically independent from each other, damaged ones of the TFTs may not affect normal driving of an LCD panel. Moreover, since the space between the second source line 164 and the second drain line 173 is formed relatively narrow, an overall size of the switching device may be reduced, thereby reducing fabrication costs.
It will be apparent to those skilled in the art that various modifications and variations can be made in the LCD device and method of fabricating an LCD device of the present invention without departing from the spirit or scope of the invention. Thus, it is intended that the present invention cover the modifications and variations of this invention provided they come within the scope of the appended claims and their equivalents.
Claims
1. A method of fabricating a liquid crystal display including forming a switching device located in a driving circuit region on a liquid crystal display panel, the switching device having a plurality of amorphous thin film transistor groups connected in parallel with a gate line, a source line and a drain line,
- wherein each thin film transistor group includes a plurality of thin film transistors connected substantially in parallel with a gate electrode branched from the gate line, a source electrode branched from the source line, and a drain electrode branched from the drain line, and wherein the plurality of thin film transistors include a semiconductor pattern overlapping the gate electrode,
- wherein the step of forming the switching device comprises:
- forming the gate line and the gate electrode of each thin film transistor group on a substrate;
- forming the source line and the drain line, and the source electrode and the drain electrode of each thin film transistor group, wherein the source electrode comprises alternately arranged convex-source portions and concave-source portions and wherein the drain electrode comprises alternately arranged convex-drain portions opposite to the convex-source portions, and concave-drain portions opposite to the concave-source portions; and
- forming the semiconductor pattern of each thin film transistor group including a plurality of channels between the source electrode and the drain electrode, wherein the semiconductor pattern includes channels respectively formed only between the convex-source portions and the convex-drain portions, the channels disconnected from each other through the semiconductor pattern,
- wherein the semiconductor pattern non-overlap the gate line, the source line and the drain line, and is independently formed in the each thin film transistor group and wherein the gate electrode and the semiconductor pattern overlaps only the convex-source portions and the convex-drain portions.
2. The method according to claim 1, wherein the step of forming a semiconductor pattern includes forming a plurality of semiconductor patterns to separate each of the plurality of channels.
3. The method according to claim 1, wherein the driving circuit includes a gate driving circuit on the liquid crystal display panel.
4. The method according to claim 1, wherein the switching device is formed in a multiplexer of a data driving region of the liquid crystal display panel.
5. A method of fabricating a liquid crystal display including forming a switching device on a liquid crystal display panel, the switching device having a plurality of amorphous thin film transistor groups connected in parallel with a gate line, a source line and a drain line,
- wherein each thin film transistor group includes a plurality of thin film transistors connected substantially in parallel with a gate electrode branched from the gate line, a source electrode branched from the source line, and a drain electrode branched from the drain line, and wherein the plurality of thin film transistors include a semiconductor pattern overlapping the gate electrode,
- wherein the step of forming the switching device comprises:
- forming the gate line and the gate electrode of each thin film transistor group on a substrate;
- forming the source line and the drain line, and the source electrode and the drain electrode of each thin film transistor group, wherein the source electrode comprises alternately arranged convex-source portions and concave-source portions and wherein the drain electrode comprises alternately arranged convex-drain portions opposite to the convex-source portions, and concave-drain portions opposite to the concave-source portions;
- forming the semiconductor pattern of each thin film transistor group including a plurality of channels between the source electrode and the drain electrode, and a plurality of holes penetrating through the semiconductor pattern so that the channels are disconnected from each other through the semiconductor pattern,
- wherein the plurality of channels respectively are formed between the concave-drain portions and the convex-source portions, and between the convex-drain portions and the concave-source portions and wherein the semiconductor pattern non-overlaps the gate line, the source line and the drain line, and is independently formed in the each thin film transistor group.
6. The method according to claim 5, wherein the driving circuit includes a gate driving circuit on the liquid crystal display panel.
7. The method according to claim 5, wherein the switching device is formed in a multiplexer of a data driving region of the liquid crystal display panel.
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Type: Grant
Filed: May 15, 2009
Date of Patent: Apr 27, 2010
Patent Publication Number: 20090239322
Assignee: LG Display Co., Ltd. (Seoul)
Inventors: Yong Ho Jang (Kyounggi-do), Soo Young Yoon (Kyounggi-do)
Primary Examiner: Wael Fahmy
Assistant Examiner: John C Ingham
Attorney: McKenna Long & Aldridge LLP
Application Number: 12/453,618
International Classification: H01L 21/00 (20060101);